What do you think of my NEW rating system? w/NEW poll

[VIAN]

By neglecting my C's I've noticed that my rating system isn't entirely complete. I myself was not remembering the meanings of each Letter Grade. So I've revised it and want to know what you think about it either by poll or post, or both. My goal is to have a simple, easy to understand grading system that communicates effectively. Thanks in advance.

Simplified Rating System


Here is a new version. Instead of saying Grade = A. I'd say the game is Category 8.

Color-Coded Category Rating System

 

[nycxandy]

Overall and Somewhat plus the + and -'s are too much. You're leaving much to interpretation with the overall and somewhat. Since you already have a yes, why is there an overall option? The first 3 choices are basically varieties of yes and with an addition of plus and minuses leave a significant deal of ambuguity. You might as well stick to a 0-5 point system or something like that, but they're not great.

A rating system modeled after a school grading system with letters and + and -'s is better. 1UP/EGM employs this method. A is excellent, B is good, C is average, D is bad and F is crap.

If you want pure simplicity I've heard of a 2 choice system based on the question: Would you recommend this game? Yes or No. Simple and straight to the point. I like this the best since it does away with that much influential, but meaningless rating/score and relies on someone to actually read the text review for a full opinion.

 

[purbeast0]

i think it's awful.

there is actually an article in the latest EGM about it and how bad it is, and how non-gamers are the ones making these ratings up, and how they don't even play the majority of the games only watch a short video of gameplay that is sent to them from the developers.

the fact that AO is being treated like NC-17 of the movie system is retarded. AO should be be treated as an R rated movie.

in the EGM the writer talks about how the AO rating should just be completely gone with. I agree 100%.

EDIT:

wow lol I shoulda read the OP before I posted

about that rating system so far i'm not liking it. i prefer the number rating out of 10 instead of the letter grading. i wasn't liking the latest egm.

 

[oznerol]

I vastly prefer the "Buy it, rent it, avoid it" system, or maybe a "get it immediately," "get it when it's cheap," "don't bother getting it" system.

The only reason to rank games with letters or numbers is to compare them to other games, which I think is retarded. That, and many of these games don't age well, so over time these letter/number grades given will become irrelevant - since you'd end up comparing a "9.4" PS2 game vs. an "9.0" PS3 game, which in most cases isn't realistic. A "buy it" PS2 game vs. a "buy it" PS3 game, however, would still remain valid.

 

[R Nilla]

Originally posted by: ducci
I vastly prefer the "Buy it, rent it, avoid it" system, or maybe a "get it immediately," "get it when it's cheap," "don't bother getting it" system.

The only reason to rank games with letters or numbers is to compare them to other games, which I think is retarded. That, and many of these games don't age well, so over time these letter/number grades given will become irrelevant - since you'd end up comparing a "9.4" PS2 game vs. an "9.0" PS3 game, which in most cases isn't realistic. A "buy it" PS2 game vs. a "buy it" PS3 game, however, would still remain valid.

:thumbsup: the 10 point scale is meaningless anyway because 80% of those numbers mean the game is not worth playing to most people. A lot of people won't consider anything under 8 or even 9. What ducci has outlined makes a lot more sense and is ultimately more meaningful.

 

[AstroManLuca]

Originally posted by: R Nilla

Originally posted by: ducci
I vastly prefer the "Buy it, rent it, avoid it" system, or maybe a "get it immediately," "get it when it's cheap," "don't bother getting it" system.

The only reason to rank games with letters or numbers is to compare them to other games, which I think is retarded. That, and many of these games don't age well, so over time these letter/number grades given will become irrelevant - since you'd end up comparing a "9.4" PS2 game vs. an "9.0" PS3 game, which in most cases isn't realistic. A "buy it" PS2 game vs. a "buy it" PS3 game, however, would still remain valid.

:thumbsup: the 10 point scale is meaningless anyway because 80% of those numbers mean the game is not worth playing to most people. A lot of people won't consider anything under 8 or even 9. What ducci has outlined makes a lot more sense and is ultimately more meaningful.

Another :thumbsup: for this. This is why I kind of prefer 1up's grading scale or GameSpy's 5-star scale. IGN and GameSpot never rate anything under 7 unless it's a truly terrible game.

There's another thing I wanted to bring up, especially given the prevalence of sequels these days. The first game of a series might get super high marks, but subsequent games don't score as high because they're often not as original (even if they're excellent games in their own right). But in many cases, it would be silly to go back and get the first game in a series and play that instead of the most recent installment. This varies, of course, depending on the series and whether it has a worthwhile storyline that you want to see in its entirety. But one example is Call Of Duty. COD1 and COD4 got the same 9.4 rating from IGN, but would you really recommend them both equally?

That's just something ratings don't (and possibly can't) take into account - how good is the game if you've never played any of its predecessors? A lot of recent Madden games have gotten poor reviews for being stagnant, but if you don't own ANY Madden, should you get the newer, lower-rated one, or the older, higher-rated one? It might be nice if reviewers would give either a separate score or simply a short paragraph saying how good the game is without considering others in the series.

 

[oznerol]

That's exactly why putting a number or letter value on a game just doesn't work - it just leads to irrelevant comparisons.

I think the main reason a "buy it", "rent it", "avoid it" scale hasn't been put to practice is because the PR companies for these games would flip a shit. Let's be honest here - reviews and review sites are essentially advertisements disguised as information. To bluntly say "avoid this game" or "just rent this game", even if that's what a mediocre letter/number score may imply, would really hurt the game's marketing campaign.

That said, I also forgot to mention the fact that not only am I a fan of the 3-tiered rating system, I am also a fan of multiple people reviewing a single game. EGM does (did?) this, but very few other sites do. I dislike the fact that many people on forums just tie a review to a particular site - "IGN gave this game a 9!" or "Gamespot gave it a 7.8!" when it should be "Hillary Goldstein gave this game a 9" and "Jeff Gerstman gave this game a 7.8." If you ignore the "money-hat, bias conspiracy," these reviews are just one person's opinion. If you have differing preferences than this person, or value things differently in a game than them, then your "score" would be different. This is why having multiple people on a single review is ideal.

But that requires time and money, which most review sites just don't have. And in EGM's case, they sacrifice review depth/content when they have 3 people reviewing 1 game (note, I haven't read an EGM in a while, so this may have changed).

 

[skace]

I always liked the "buy it/avoid it" 1 or 0 type system. A lot of reviews usually come down to the "was it fun" question regardless of where the actual review rating ends up. I've seen them rate a game a 6 and then go "but it's really a fun game and you should play it". And that is really the only question that matters to me, was it fun?

 

[RandomFool]

I've always favored the 5 star review style. It's general enough to get the idea across but allows for more options than rent, buy, skip. Buy, rent, skip is nice for it's black and white(and grey) -ness but there are some games that should be rated better than others. It doesn't give you much of a reference between games. So if Godfather 2 and GTA4 are both rated buy and you only want to buy one of them. There's isn't a quick way to determine which one you want to get (unless you actually read the review that is). Letter grades are roughly the same as 5 stars but it seems like Letter tend to skew higher than stars.

Ranking out of 10 or 100 gives to many options and i don't think you can realistically can't get that granular with an opinion. Although, ranking out of 10 or 100 makes sense for places like Metacritic where the score is an average of multiple reviews.

 

[skace]

Originally posted by: RandomFool
There's isn't a quick way to determine which one you want to get (unless you actually read the review that is).

Right, and reading the review should be encouraged. Making buying decisions based off of some arbitrary number is really poor. Knowing that the game is a buy or a skip is good, if you then are trying to decide between 2 games you should read the reviews on each and use your own educated decision. You may find out that even though Godfather is a 7 and GTA is a 9 that you actually like Godfather better.

 

[IceBergSLiM]

describe the difference between ok and functional. I can't distinguish.

 

[RandomFool]

Originally posted by: skace

Originally posted by: RandomFool
There's isn't a quick way to determine which one you want to get (unless you actually read the review that is).

Right, and reading the review should be encouraged. Making buying decisions based off of some arbitrary number is really poor. Knowing that the game is a buy or a skip is good, if you then are trying to decide between 2 games you should read the reviews on each and use your own educated decision. You may find out that even though Godfather is a 7 and GTA is a 9 that you actually like Godfather better.

I agree that the review should be read but it's nice to be able to say to someone who hasn't and probably won't read the reviews, "this game got 5 stars" or 95%.

 

[mugs]

My friend, this is the greatest leap forward in grading technology since the invention of the Dewey Decimal System.

 

[whistleclient]

yeah, um... you can't copyright the A, B, C grading system.

 

[gorcorps]

Originally posted by: mugs
My friend, this is the greatest leap forward in grading technology since the invention of the Dewey Decimal System.

the dewey decimal system grades things?

 

[VIAN]

Originally posted by: mugs
My friend, this is the greatest leap forward in grading technology since the invention of the Dewey Decimal System.

Do I detect sarcasm?

Originally posted by: tangent1138
yeah, um... you can't copyright the A, B, C grading system.

that's not just what I'm copyrighting. I'm copyrighting the whole jpg.

 

[mugs]

Originally posted by: VIAN

Originally posted by: mugs
My friend, this is the greatest leap forward in grading technology since the invention of the Dewey Decimal System.

Do I detect sarcasm?

You do. gocorps didn't.

 

[oznerol]

lol at putting a copyright on them.

And double lol at using the same number-based scale yet say the numbers are just for tilt.

 

[VIAN]

I think this scale is a good compromise. It is a numbered scale, although the colors and Labels are more important, and most of the values aren't going to waste. Here is the difference:

-Categories 7-9 are comparable to 8.5-10.
-Categories 4-6 are comparable to 7.0-8.4.
-Categories 1-3 are comparable to 5.5-6.9.

Originally posted by: AstroManLuca
That's just something ratings don't (and possibly can't) take into account - how good is the game if you've never played any of its predecessors? A lot of recent Madden games have gotten poor reviews for being stagnant, but if you don't own ANY Madden, should you get the newer, lower-rated one, or the older, higher-rated one? It might be nice if reviewers would give either a separate score or simply a short paragraph saying how good the game is without considering others in the series.

This is where you read the review to find out why it had a lower score. What kind of service would it provide to a current Madden owners? That's a lot of people. Generally, people who played the first game in a franchise will want to play the 2nd, if it is good. They have to be told how it compares to the first one. What you're saying about people never having played the game before doesn't make sense. You can't rate a game based on it's own merits because it isn't the only one on the market. I'm sure even Cat in the Hat on the PS2 would be awesome if that were the case.

Originally posted by: ducci
I vastly prefer the "Buy it, rent it, avoid it" system, or maybe a "get it immediately," "get it when it's cheap," "don't bother getting it" system.

The only reason to rank games with letters or numbers is to compare them to other games, which I think is retarded. That, and many of these games don't age well, so over time these letter/number grades given will become irrelevant - since you'd end up comparing a "9.4" PS2 game vs. an "9.0" PS3 game, which in most cases isn't realistic. A "buy it" PS2 game vs. a "buy it" PS3 game, however, would still remain valid.

Firstly, even though I put Buy, Rent, Avoid in the new scale, those terms themselves are biased because they assume you are a type of gamer. A number system is more generalized. But I think I'll keep those terms until I find more generalized ones.

On your second paragraph there you are saying the exact same thing. A "buy it" PS2 game vs a "buy it" PS3 game is the same as a 9.0 PS2 game vs a 9.0 PS3 game. You are comparing the same arbitrary rating between two generations VS another arbitrary rating between two generations. The point is that you have to see beyond the score and recognize what your buying, and what the score means. Because a score is only contemporary is only comparable to things before it. A 9.0 now means more than a 9.0 before. It's like inflation. This happens because games get better and better, but the number system remains the same. And there isn't anything you can do about that.

 

[Aikouka]

You know that Gamepro so had this with their dude in a box system where they were either green, yellow or red depending on the suckage of the game .

 

[JJChicken]

no offense but this rating system isnt any different to a 0-10 system, except its missing a digit. I want my 10s damnit! The main problem is not rating systems, its how reviewers rate games. As was said in an earlier post, reviewers aren't going to give below 7 and in any rating system the reviews are going to be positively skewed that is. The best rating system would be where reviewers are honest, e.g. like rotten tomatoes for movies.

 

[VIAN]

Originally posted by: Aikouka
You know that Gamepro so had this with their dude in a box system where they were either green, yellow or red depending on the suckage of the game .

...forgot about that. I don't think they use it anymore though.

 

[VIAN]

Originally posted by: Barack Obama
no offense but this rating system isnt any different to a 0-10 system, except its missing a digit. I want my 10s damnit! The main problem is not rating systems, its how reviewers rate games. As was said in an earlier post, reviewers aren't going to give below 7 and in any rating system the reviews are going to be positively skewed that is. The best rating system would be where reviewers are honest, e.g. like rotten tomatoes for movies.

I don't know how honest they could be giving Bio-Dome and 8 out of 100.

I like to think the game that I spent 60 bucks on is going to be good. So I work from 100% and lower as I see fit. That's the way a gamer is going to look at it. They are going to expect and then either be disappointed or not. So the rating system is really the level of disappointment you are expected to face.

 

[oznerol]

Originally posted by: VIAN
Firstly, even though I put Buy, Rent, Avoid in the new scale, those terms themselves are biased because they assume you are a type of gamer. A number system is more generalized. But I think I'll keep those terms until I find more generalized ones.

On your second paragraph there you are saying the exact same thing. A "buy it" PS2 game vs a "buy it" PS3 game is the same as a 9.0 PS2 game vs a 9.0 PS3 game. You are comparing the same arbitrary rating between two generations VS another arbitrary rating between two generations. The point is that you have to see beyond the score and recognize what your buying, and what the score means. Because a score is only contemporary is only comparable to things before it. A 9.0 now means more than a 9.0 before. It's like inflation. This happens because games get better and better, but the number system remains the same. And there isn't anything you can do about that.

Your logic is wrong. I am not insisting that there is some correlation between a "buy it" game and a score - however, it is a concept you are set in, apparently. Giving some arbitrary score to a game is truly meaningless in the first place.

A number system is not more generalized - as it is the direct cause of ridiculous comparisons. Comparing a PSP game to a PS3 game, for example. Or a DS game to an Xbox 360 game. The number is irrelevant. However, a game you should buy is a game you should buy, regardless of the platform. There is no "inflation" with this.

Brain Age for the DS is a good example. What kind of score should this game get? Surely it isn't comparable to a God of War or Call of Duty, but the game has merit in its own right. Even comparing it to other DS titles, such as Pokemon Diamond or Advance Wars, a score to distinguish between these games is absurd. I would consider all of these titles "buyable" - especially given Brain Age's $20 or less price tag.

So maybe you will say to yourself - ok, then just group games in different genres and score them according to your scale based on these genres - so the "casual game" 9.0 is only comparable to a "casual game" 8.0. This is messy and just plain unnecessary.

 

[VIAN]

The correlation that I follow at metacritic.com is that anything 80% or higher is safer to buy because there is a significantly higher chance of actually enjoying the game. My new ratings system doesn't follow that. Like I said, it is that solely to provide tilt. But it is also great because it provides a reference to compare games with. But not between a DS and a 360. I don't think the rating system was ever supposed to be used for those kind of comparisons. A game on the 360 could only be compared to another game on the 360 or to a PS3, or game from a system with similar graphical power. With a game, the experience and price play in role in its rating.

I also agree to having different rating scales for different genres would be really insane. But I expect the consumer to be a little educated on their part. I don't agree with places like IGN or Gamespot, who say that when Tony Hawk gets a 9.5, it is so good that everyone will enjoy it, even it is not their favorite genre. I expect the consumer to be smart and say, "Hey, I don't like skating games, so I won't buy it."